Adjust sentencing

Published: Monday, April 15, 2013 at 08:00 AM.

Florida should have been shamed long ago into fixing its extreme juvenile sentencing system. Now, thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court, it’s being forced to do so.

The court has ruled in recent years that the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment limits states from sentencing juveniles to death or life in prison. State Sen. Rob Bradley, R-Orange Park, has been charged with bringing Florida into compliance with decisions involving life sentences for juveniles. He’s introduced a measure, which passed a committee vote last week, that would mandate 50 years in prison as the maximum sentence for a juvenile who didn’t commit murder.

It’s a start and Bradley gets credit for tackling a thankless task. But a 50-year sentence essentially keeps the old system by ensuring that those offenders would spend nearly all of their life in prison or die there before the end of their sentences.

Bradley’s bill would still allow juveniles to get life sentences for homicides. The big difference would be a mandatory hearing where a judge considers factors related to the defendant’s age and circumstances, an improvement but hardly in line with the spirit of the court’s decisions.

Groups including a state commission on juvenile justice and Florida TaxWatch have recommended that at least juveniles who didn’t commit capital murder should get a chance at parole. But Florida abolished its parole system and Bradley doesn’t want to bring it back for juveniles because he’s concerned about the impact on victims’ families.

“I am not comfortable with a hearing occurring every five years or so where a family shows up and argues about why the defendant who killed their loved one should stay in jail,” he told the Florida Times-Union.

A bill introduced by Sen. Darren Soto, D-Orlando, would still require life sentences for juvenile defendants but allow them to be up for parole 15 to 25 years after their sentencing. It would make sense to meld the two approaches, creating more reasonable sentences for juveniles while also providing a chance for someone who did something awful as a child to show that they’ve changed as an adult.

Florida should have been shamed long ago into fixing its extreme juvenile sentencing system. Now, thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court, it’s being forced to do so.

The court has ruled in recent years that the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment limits states from sentencing juveniles to death or life in prison. State Sen. Rob Bradley, R-Orange Park, has been charged with bringing Florida into compliance with decisions involving life sentences for juveniles. He’s introduced a measure, which passed a committee vote last week, that would mandate 50 years in prison as the maximum sentence for a juvenile who didn’t commit murder.

It’s a start and Bradley gets credit for tackling a thankless task. But a 50-year sentence essentially keeps the old system by ensuring that those offenders would spend nearly all of their life in prison or die there before the end of their sentences.

Bradley’s bill would still allow juveniles to get life sentences for homicides. The big difference would be a mandatory hearing where a judge considers factors related to the defendant’s age and circumstances, an improvement but hardly in line with the spirit of the court’s decisions.

Groups including a state commission on juvenile justice and Florida TaxWatch have recommended that at least juveniles who didn’t commit capital murder should get a chance at parole. But Florida abolished its parole system and Bradley doesn’t want to bring it back for juveniles because he’s concerned about the impact on victims’ families.

“I am not comfortable with a hearing occurring every five years or so where a family shows up and argues about why the defendant who killed their loved one should stay in jail,” he told the Florida Times-Union.

A bill introduced by Sen. Darren Soto, D-Orlando, would still require life sentences for juvenile defendants but allow them to be up for parole 15 to 25 years after their sentencing. It would make sense to meld the two approaches, creating more reasonable sentences for juveniles while also providing a chance for someone who did something awful as a child to show that they’ve changed as an adult.

There are juveniles currently in prison for truly terrible crimes. It’s tempting to think there is no chance at rehabilitation, so society would be best served by locking them up and throwing away the key.

Yet as the Supreme Court noted, the very nature of being a juvenile means that you’re immature and fail to appreciate risks and consequences. Many offenders come from such dysfunctional situations that prison is the first time they’ve had any stability.

It’s not too much to hope that there’s enough capacity for rehabilitation in our prison system that a 15-year-old offender would change for the better by 30 or 40 years old. Florida should develop appropriate sentencing for juveniles before the Supreme Court again forces the issue.

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